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Japanese engineering researchers say they have created a tiny electronic light the size of a firefly which rides waves of ultrasound, and could eventually figure in applications ranging from moving displays to projection mapping.

Japan is taking steps to help aging business owners find buyers for their companies rather than shut them down for lack of suitable successors. By doing so, it seeks to protect jobs and economic value as the population ages and shrinks. The country has 2.45 million small and midsize businesses run by those at or over the average retirement age of 70, roughly half of which are without successors. An even larger number are run by those aged 65 to 69. Around 28,000 businesses closed their doors in 2017, according to Tokyo Shoko Research -- a 30% increase in 10 years.

Japan has again been forced to confront its work culture after labour inspectors ruled that the death of a 31-year-old journalist at the country’s public broadcaster, NHK, had been caused by overwork. Miwa Sado, who worked at the broadcaster’s headquarters in Tokyo, logged 159 hours of overtime and took only two days off in the month leading up to her death from heart failure in July 2013.

A research team led by Teruyuki Hirano of Tokyo Institute of Technology's Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences has validated 15 exoplanets orbiting red dwarf systems. One of the brightest red dwarfs, K2-155 that is around 200 light years away from Earth, has three transiting super-Earths. Of those three super-Earths, the outermost planet, K2-155d, with a radius 1.6 times that of Earth, could be within the host star's habitable zone.

Japan's third-largest electricity provider is emerging as one of the first major companies in the world to trial a promising bitcoin payments technology. Revealed exclusively to CoinDesk, Chubu Electric Power Co. has entered into a proof-of-concept with local bitcoin and Internet of Things (IoT) startup Nayuta, one that finds it exploring how bitcoin payments can be made via the Lightning Network, an in-development protocol that promises to cut costs for bitcoin users.

Japan has the world’s oldest population, with more than a quarter of its citizens aged 65 or older. The ageing population has already put a strain on Japan’s financial system and retail industry. But in recent years, another unexpected trend has been unfolding: In record numbers, elderly people in Japan are committing petty crimes so they can spend the rest of their days in prison.

Japan is believed to be preparing to execute as many as 13 members of a doomsday cult in what could become the country’s biggest round of hangings in the past decade. Tuesday marked the 23rd anniversary of Aum Shinrikyo’s sarin nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway, which killed 13 people and caused illness among thousands of others.

The USS Lexington was discovered in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Australia (by 800 km). The ship took part in the Battle of the Coral Sea and will actually be left on the ocean floor since the US Navy considers it a war grave.

Japan is more focused on a securing major trade deal with the European Union than pursuing an agreement with a post-Brexit Britain, a senior minister has said. Shinichi Iida, minister for public diplomacy and media, said his country's "first and foremost priority" was rubber-stamping its historic trade agreement with Brussels – the largest the EU has ever signed – before work could begin on establishing lucrative free trade deals with the UK.

A Japanese worker has been reprimanded by her boss for “selfishly breaking the rules” after she became pregnant before it was her “turn”, according to media reports. The woman was working at a private childcare centre in Aichi prefecture, north Japan, when she found out she was pregnant.

Lightning lights up the ash cloud above Shinmoedake peak as the volcano erupts between Miyazaki and Kagoshima prefectures, southwestern Japan, in a photo taken by a remote camera and released by Kyodo News, April 5, 2018.

If President Trump decides to re-enter the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Japan, the biggest economic player in the deal, would welcome him with open arms, a top Japanese diplomat told Axios on Wednesday, before Trump directed his top advisers to take a fresh look at the deal.

Coca-Cola has launched its first alcoholic drink, a lemon flavoured alcopop, in Japan in a bid to tap new markets and consumers. In a global first for the US drinks giant, three fizzy lemon drinks went on sale on Monday. The product aims at a growing market of young drinkers - especially women.

This might be the one time in your adult life when it’s appropriate to say “Nice melons” to a stranger. Over the weekend, a pair of Yubari melons sold for a record-breaking ¥3.2 million (US $29,436) at an auction held in the city of Sapporo. The two melons were bought by Shinya Noda, the president of a fruit and vegetable packing company.

The city of Sapporo began issuing cards serving as proof of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender partnerships on Friday, responding to calls from couples seeking portable evidence they can present in emergencies and other situations. The city in Hokkaido started authenticating partnership oaths submitted by sexual-minority couples in June last year, but had only issued a certificate in the form of an A4-size (21 cm by 29.7 cm) document.

Japan has told the United States it is ready to dispatch experts to North Korea to help the country dismantle nuclear facilities toward the “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula, government sources repeated. If Washington and Pyongyang agree to demolish North Korea’s graphite-moderated reactor at Nyongbyon in the northwest, Tokyo would offer knowledge gained from decommissioning a similar reactor in eastern Japan, the sources said Friday.

Resplendent in shocking pink, a sleek "Hello Kitty" bullet train, complete with special carriages festooned with images of the global icon from Japan, has been unveiled before it chugs into service this week. The special shinkansen or bullet train will run for the next three months between the western cities of Osaka and Fukuoka from Saturday, the West Japan Railway firm said, hoping that one of the country's most famous exports will boost tourism.

A rocket developed by a maverick Japanese entrepreneur and convicted fraudster exploded shortly after liftoff Saturday, in a major blow to his bid to send Japan's first privately backed rocket into space. Interstellar Technologies, founded by popular internet service provider Livedoor's creator Takafumi Horie, launched the unmanned rocket, MOMO-2, at around 5:30 a.m. from a test site in Taiki, southern Hokkaido.

There’s a moment in BBC2’s documentary Japan’s Secret Shame where Japanese journalist Shiori Ito returns for the first time in three years to a Tokyo hotel, where she alleges she was raped by a prominent TV broadcaster and reporter. “I can already feel that my body is reacting,” she says in the programme. It’s night-time, similar conditions to the evening of the alleged attack. “It’s the light I remember, this light,” Ito adds, looking up at rows of hotel windows. There’s a pause. “I have to go.”

Megumi Yokota was just 13 when she disappeared. On her way home from badminton practice at her junior high school, she vanished somewhere along the eight-minute walk to her house in this seaside town. It was just after sunset on Nov. 15, 1977, and the weather records from that day show a calm sea and clear sky.

Hundreds of thousands of people across a wide swathe of western and central Japan were evacuated from their homes on Friday as torrential rains pounded the nation, flooding rivers, setting off landslides and leaving at least two people dead. The Japan Meteorological Agency said the rainfall was "historic" and warned more rain was set to batter already saturated parts of the nation through Sunday.

Parts of western Japan hit by deadly floods and landslides face unprecedented danger, officials warn, with more downpours expected. Scores of people have died, while about 1.5 million people have been ordered to leave their homes and three million more advised to do so. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says the rescue effort is a "race against the clock".